Dare Read online

  Dare

  (Naughty Neighbors 2)

  Olivia Aycock

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

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  Dare Copyright © 2015 by Olivia Aycock

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  All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce, distribute, or transmit in any form or by any means. For information regarding subsidiary rights, please contact the Author.

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  Manufactured in the United States of America

  First Edition June 2015

  Chapter 1

  Pizza and a movie?

  She stared down at the screen of her phone, thumb hovering, waiting for her neurons to fire properly to send off a response. Yes? No. Should they?

  It was code, of course, for “wanna fuck after you get home from work?”

  Wasn’t the most original code, but it worked for them.

  And it really worked for Melanie. Whenever her coworkers suggested they order in pizza, she invariably spent thirty minutes in the back conference room with her thighs clenched together, trying to hold at bay the memory of the last time Will had driven into her.

  “You’re ridiculous,” she muttered to the phone. But she was the ridiculous one. Mention pizza and she went off, a regular Pavlov’s dog.

  Yeah, a horndog.

  Pushing some papers around on the ugly laminate desk did not help Melanie ignore her cell. The subtle buzz had her desperate to read the second text. Would it be her “order” for the evening?

  Her coworker Sue always ordered pepperoni and mushroom on her half. Benign, and rather pedestrian, pizza toppings. But pepperoni and mushroom was code for blowjob. Add green peppers to that order? Sit on my face.

  When Sue ordered a combination pizza—complete with sausage and onions—Melanie typically had to excuse herself from lunch and run to the ladies’ restroom on the fifteenth floor for some emergency alone time. Because combination pizza? I’m going to tie you to my wrought iron headboard and fuck you so hard for so long our pizza will be stone cold when I let you go.

  Melanie loved combination pizza night.

  She loved all the pizza nights with Will.

  And that was the problem.

  Looking over her shoulder to make sure Sue or some other office busybody wasn’t groundhogging over the cubicle wall, she set her thumb to the sensor. Phone unlocked, she checked her latest text. Crap. It was from her sister Pam. No, she couldn’t manage to drive out to Paradise Valley at the last minute so Pam and her husband could go to the movie. On a school night. Melanie had pizza and a movie waiting for her. Pam could figure something out.

  And before she could figure out what she was doing with Will, she texted back maybe and hit send before she could change her mind.

  It wasn’t fifteen seconds before her phone buzzed in her hand. Will must be working on his computer.

  What if cheese and Star Wars is on the table?

  Fuck. Cheese and Star Wars. He played dirty. How did he know she needed a nice, easy comfort fuck on the couch and a movie she could watch with her eyes closed?

  And that was the precisely the problem. Will was starting to be eerily in tune with what she needed. And that was—well, that was not good. Oh, it made for great sex. But it didn’t make for great emotional health.

  She liked their arrangement the way it was. Polite, cordial neighbor-to-neighbor hellos in the mornings in the apartment complex gym. Friendly waves in the parking lot, maybe an extra pair of hands if she’d made a warehouse store run. Small talk at the mailboxes.

  And absolutely filthy fucking when either wasn’t otherwise engaged.

  When Melanie and Will had started enjoying friends-with-benefits status, oh, maybe eight months ago when they’d fallen into bed after an apartment complex barbecue, it had been easy. Casual. Gorgeously fun. She’d just broken up with a dud of a boyfriend and he’d been recently cut loose by his long-term girlfriend, who picked an East Coast lateral transfer over a shiny gold band.

  Yeah, she might have felt a little guilty about jumping on Will’s cock so soon after his heartbreak, except his cock was magnificent. It was enough to make her forget hooking up with a neighbor never ended well.

  A voice cleared pointedly behind her. Looks like it was magnificent enough to make her forget she was at work too. She shuffled a few more papers and turned around, faking surprise when she saw busybody Sue was, indeed, poking her head up over the sad greige wall of her cubicle.

  “Melanie, did the boss tell you what to do with that Philips account?”

  After some mind-numbing businessy stuff, she volunteered to make a fancy-coffee run. She hated going on the fancy-coffee run—being responsible for everyone’s inane orders and for bringing them back without spilling them was not her idea of fun. But it would give her some unobserved time to text while in line.

  She hoped there was a line.

  There was a line. And a couple texts waiting for her.

  Melanie ignored her sister’s plaintive messages and focused on crafting her response to Will.

  It was ridiculous, the amount of time she spent thinking about her answers these days. Long gone were the enthusiastic Hell yeahs or the regretful I have other plans tonights. Now she had to actually think, plan, prepare her responses.

  It was perilously close to the kind of maneuvers one took when one was being courted by a handsome gentleman. And that thought had her chewing her lip and getting nudged by the impatient suit behind her.

  While Melanie waited for the innumerable half-caf, agave, no-whip, extra-foam bullshit orders from her coworkers—ha, wonder what the sex code would be like in coffee, not pizza, form?—she typed in her reply.

  I guess that’s cool.

  I guess that’s cool? Two hours worth of worrying it over in her mind and all she’d managed to reply with was “I guess that’s cool”?

  She was in so much trouble.

  Chapter 2

  Will Harris was in so much trouble.

  Mel hadn’t texted in hours, and, when she did, it wasn’t the response he’d expected. She usually jumped on a cheese and Star Wars night order. It was the perfect night, really. He loved their wild and crazy times together, sure, but the quiet, easy nights were perfect.

  We can scrap the pizza. Think I’m watching the game. Come on over if you feel like it.

  There. That was a good one. Unobtrusive. Safe. It would leave what came next entirely up to her, because if she came over with zero expectations, that would make what came next easier. For him, at any rate. Because he wasn’t quite sure how to broach the “come over for an almost-threesome” topic.

  Not that they hadn’t talked about it. Obsessively fantasized about it together. Some of the hottest sex they’d had were the times he’d pull her hair back and talk dirty in her ear. “You want someone to see us like this? See you with your ass high in the air, begging for my cock?” She’d clench tight around him when he directed her to imagine their imaginary voyeur jacking off as he watched Will pound into her sweet pussy from behind.

  But as many times as they’d both come to the idea of being watched—enthusiastically—they had never agreed on a plan of action. No potential order for when the big day came. The pizza toppings started out as a joke and then just became shorthand. A sly reminder of their secret.

  But it wouldn’t be a secret much longer if Melanie came over tonight while their new neighbor Judd was over. Because Judd had agreed to watch.

  Tonight, if it suited them.

  It had come as a surprise. They were friendly with each other—there were only four apartments that shared the breezeway in their bui
lding. But Judd traveled a lot. Medical sales. His apartment seemed more a crashpad than a home. But last month he and Judd had gone to a few playoff games together—Judd had access to a deluxe corporate box—and Judd had come out with them for Melanie’s twenty-fourth birthday.

  But this morning when Will was over helping Judd assemble a bookcase, he’d gone to grab Judd’s toolbox. Only to grab a toolbox full of kinky shit, not tools.

  He’d been so excited, trying to play it cool. But finding out Judd’s kinky secret was like discovering his neighbor was an angel from heaven. No, not an angel, because that shit was anything but angelic. More like a superhero. A mild-mannered medical salesman by day, Master of Kink by night.

  And the answer to his and Melanie’s kinky dreams.

  He and Mel had engaged in some pretty heavy fantasy play over the past few months, daring each other to go a little bit beyond their comfort zones until they’d done just about everything on their lists. Their fairly vanilla lists, Will amended.

  It was good sex, fantastic sex, but it wasn’t all that kinky. And they both agreed that the one thing they had always wanted to do, but hadn’t, was engage in some exhibitionism.

  As far as fantasies went, it was pretty tame. Yeah, he watched some kinky porn from time to time—and what guy hadn’t fantasized about being tied up and fucked by two women—but he was secure in his fairly vanilla preferences. But when Melanie had confessed one night she fantasized about being watched? By another man? It had lit up pleasure zones in him he hadn’t expected to be lit up. He liked the idea a lot. A whole lot. But what could he do about it? He worked from home, his colleagues in different time zones. And most of his Phoenix friends had been his ex’s friends. Short of going out to a bar and picking up a stranger—which didn’t suit him or Mel—what could they do?

  And then he’d met Judd.

  Judd of the attachment points and bondage tape and sexy purple rope.

  “You think she’s gonna go for it?”

  Judd’s baritone cut through the commercial’s blare. They were sprawled on his worn leather couch drinking afternoon suds, watching the first of a doubleheader. Will glanced over and noted Judd was relaxed, legs spread, not outwardly excited about what could potentially go down tonight. It wasn’t like it was anything major for the guy. Some voyeurism. No big deal. Regular Wednesday night stuff. But for Will, it was everything. It was making Melanie’s biggest fantasy come true. Daring her to go after it with him.

  And maybe chase another dare after that—because he couldn’t stop thinking about that rope.

  They’d played around at light bondage before—silk scarves and loose knots, hands barely restrained above her head. More window dressing than anything. But Will could imagine her spread out on his bed, arms and legs held wide by the restraint of knotted purple rope.

  Melanie had fantastic legs. Long and lean, honed by years of running. She’d be gorgeous—miles of pale skin adorned with intricate knotwork. The purple of the rope standing out in relief against her silky skin. Her legs trembling, muscles tightening as he took her up and up to the very edge of completion, then brought her back down. Denying her until she was frantic with the need to come.

  “Maybe I should be more worried about you going for it. You chickening out, Harris?”

  “Me?” He’d almost forgotten about Judd’s presence on the couch, so deep was he in the fantasy of Melanie and a length of purple rope. Breasts offered up to his mouth by a rope corset. And those luscious golden red curls of hers outlined by hemp.

  Was it hemp? Was that too scratchy? Did they make rope out of cotton? There was so much he didn’t know.

  Judd laughed and popped another beer. “Yeah, you. You look like you’ve been chewing clonazepam.”

  “Naw. I’m cool. And I’m pretty sure she will. Go for it. Maybe not tonight. She was kind of weird in her last text. But I don’t think she’ll turn it down too long if she knows you’re offering.”

  “Yeah, such a hardship.” Judd gestured with his beer. “Such a hardship to watch you fuck a gorgeous girl whenever she wants.”

  And that was it, part of the nerves. He wouldn’t just be fucking Melanie. He’d be sharing her, in a way, with Judd. That excited him. And made him a little nervous.

  Sure, she said she loved his dick and the things he did with it, but what if their experimentation in exhibitionism unlocked some secret place inside of her? Some secret desires and dares he couldn’t fulfill?

  Some secret desires that Judd knew all about.

  It hadn’t taken Judd long to figure out the arrangement he had with Melanie. If Will had known about the kinkmaster next door bit earlier, he might have attributed Judd’s awareness to that. But what man wouldn’t notice a gorgeous redhead living a few doors down?

  And Melanie had certainly noticed Judd of the giant biceps and linebacker’s thighs.

  “It’s all up to her, man.” He’d told Judd in no uncertain terms she wasn’t available. Not that she was his.

  Will killed the bottle and almost cracked the coffee table when he set it down.

  God, he wished she were his.

  Chapter 3

  She wasn’t hiding. She wasn’t.

  She was absolutely not hiding from Will.

  Melanie shifted into park and relished the rush of cool air for a moment before opening her car door and stepping onto the face of the sun. She looked like Medusa, she was sure—if Medusa had almost completely sweated through her blue button-down and tan skirt, that is.

  It was absolutely normal to not park in her assigned spot in the back and instead park street side.

  She was being ridiculous. Will wasn’t a creeper, but what if he were on his balcony? She still hadn’t decided what to do about tonight, and she wasn’t sure she wanted to be chatty with him anyway in the state she was in. It wasn’t a good night for cheese pizza and Star Wars. She didn’t want to be comforted.

  Melanie wasn’t sure what she wanted.

  No, she was sure she wanted a shower. Whatever happened after that…

  It had been a terrible day at work. A rolling brownout that afternoon had left them without power for a few hours, and, by the time her bosses had decided to let them go for the afternoon, traffic had turned into a vicious, snarling beast. A bunch of cross, overheated cubicle workers trying to escape tall buildings that had turned into veritable ovens in the late afternoon sun.

  For the most part, walking down fourteen flights of stairs hadn’t been an issue. She would’ve enjoyed it had it not been a claustrophobe’s nightmare—too many people, not enough fresh air.

  Ugh, the fetid air!

  One hundred and six degrees and it was just early June. Not for the first time did Melanie reconsider her career plan. What fool moved to Phoenix willingly?

  The walk to the front gate seemed to take forever. She’d long ago abandoned her killer heels in favor of flip-flops, and there was a very real possibility they were partially melting with each step she took. Maybe she’d be the one struck dead and turned into a pillar of stone, a monument to indecision.

  Once inside, she took some time to check on her balcony plants. Stalling is more like it, Mel. Yeah, if she were totally honest with herself, she was stalling, stroking and murmuring to the bright blooms. But her sweet bougainvillea plants needed some attention in this heat. Even though they loved full sun, the soul-sucking temperatures dried out the planters’ soil.

  There was a cheer from Will’s apartment. Which was odd. He usually wasn’t overly enthusiastic about sports. But she didn’t dwell on it. A cold shower and an ice-cold beer beckoned.

  Once she’d changed into a comfy, strappy tank top and running shorts, she picked up her phone. No new texts. Maybe she should just stay in tonight. Maybe she should—

  Oh, grow a pair, Mel.

  She grabbed for a long, swingy cardigan—it was always arctic cold in Will’s place—and slipped across the hall.

  Tapping the longneck against his door in a simulacrum of a knock, she
waited. They’d never exchanged keys, and that had been A-okay with her. It made their encounters spontaneous, but planned. No surprises. No awkward intrusions.

  Except she felt awkward tonight.

  Just as she turned to walk back across the breezeway, cool air blasted over the exposed skin at the nape of her neck, the backs of her thighs and calves.

  He’d opened the door.

  She kept walking.

  “Melanie?”

  She stopped at the entreaty in his voice. There was something soft, but urgent, in it that slowed her feet.

  “Mel?”

  She shivered when Will’s voice washed over her nape, his lips light and as cool as the breeze that came from his open door. His hands burned through the thin cotton of her tank top as they came to rest on her stomach, the dip of her waist. He pulled her back against him, and she let him nuzzle at that magic spot on the side of her neck.

  “I barely heard your knock. Wasn’t sure you were coming over.”

  Any other day, she would have responded with something sassy. Some tacky innuendo about coming all over him. But today, she was content to let silence be her answer.

  Just as she was content to let him kiss and nibble on her skin. God, it felt good when he held her like this.

  Will brushed her cardigan down, baring her right shoulder. The heat and stress of the day disappeared when his mouth was on her. She tried to focus on the subtle sharpness of his scruff against her skin, the raw scrape of his teeth, but he tightened his hold on her, drawing her even closer to him. She lost all ability to concentrate when his hand slipped down to cup her through the slippery fabric of her running shorts.

  His erection nudging her ass was almost as pointed as his groan. “Damn, Mel. No panties?”

  But he showed his appreciation most cruelly, gliding over her in long, teasing sweeps, torturing her with the barely-there friction of his fingers over the thin fabric, daring her to widen her stance. Daring him to delve beneath.